The Walking Dead: No Sanctuary rule questions

I'm hoping that there will be a detailed and updated FAQ coming soon, as I came across a LOT of questions when I tried to play yesterday. I feel the rulebook needed some more pictures and diagrams of game concepts. The videos posted online still had what seemed to be non-final rules and art, so I couldn't be sure what was correct when I had questions. Also, having several (and larger) copies of the Turn Reference card would have been great.

Okay, let's see what I remember after playing the Scavenger Run scenario...

1) I'm unclear about the use of Allies. They are considered Survivors, but there seem to be situations where it becomes confusing to me - do they get stressed; there are no spots for those tokens (or do they share the spaces for the Exert tokens?). If a leader sets the Approach as red and another player is Defiant (say, playing a green card) - the leader gets one Stress token. Now, the Ally of that Defiant Survivor...they follow suit with the Survivor, right? So that means they have to play a green card, or lose a Trust token? If so, they are Compliant with their Survivor, but Defiant against the Leader - will the Leader get another Stress token? What if the Ally plays a red card, being compliant with the Leader, but against what the Survivor played? They lose a Trust token to do so, but does the Controlling Survivor get stressed by that action?

2) Also regarding Allies - they have no Survivor tokens - so does that mean they cannot contribute to the Active Event? Since in a two player game where there are two Survivors and two Allies, the event would have been picked by one of those Survivors, that means there are only two characters who can prevent the Leader from getting stressed due to non-participation and one of them is the one who picked that card. Is that correct? When setting up, following the Rulebook, the Ally is mentioned but then the term "Survivor" is used and not mentioned again until later, so I was confused.

3) Language clarification: specifically when instructed to choose a Survivor. On Rick's Ally card, "Inspire" instructs you to, "Choose 1 other Survivor..." I take that to mean he cannot target himself due to the use of, "other". Citing this example, on Glenn's Ally card, his "Guide" ability says, "Choose 1 Survivor on your Tile to..."; the question here is, can Glenn choose himself? I encountered this language on several cards, such as Rick's card that allows him to Heal.

4) Objective Track - timing: if the conditions to advance the track more than once space exist during the Objective Phase, can it jump several spaces, or is it restricted to one move per phase?

do they get stressed; there are no spots for those tokens (or do they share the spaces for the Exert tokens?).

Allies can get stressed. Also, minor note, but those spots are for Stress tokens. Exert tokens, like Trust and Focus tokens, are just accumulated on the Sheet, and don't have a designated spot in which they are placed.

If a leader sets the Approach as red and another player is Defiant (say, playing a green card) - the leader gets one Stress token. Now, the Ally of that Defiant Survivor...they follow suit with the Survivor, right? So that means they have to play a green card, or lose a Trust token? If so, they are Compliant with their Survivor, but Defiant against the Leader - will the Leader get another Stress token? What if the Ally plays a red card, being compliant with the Leader, but against what the Survivor played? They lose a Trust token to do so, but does the Controlling Survivor get stressed by that action?

So, the most important rule to keep in mind here is that an Ally's approach is determined by its controlling Survivor's approach, and nothing else. Notably, an Ally's approach is not determined by the action that Ally uses during their turn. Therefore, if you're Defiant, that means your Ally is Defiant too.

To borrow your example example, let's say I'm the Leader, and I choose a Reckless (red) approach for the round. During your turn, you choose a Normal (green) Survivor Card as the one you play for the turn. I suffer 1 Stress due to you being Defiant. After you finish your turn with your Survivor, you take your turn with your Ally. Your Ally also has a Normal approach due to the card you played, so I suffer another stress for the Ally being defiant.

EDIT: As noted below, I was mistaken with regards to the Allies. They do not actually cause the Leader to suffer Stress.

When you take your turn with that Ally, you have the Normal (green) special action listed on the Ally Sheet available to use by default (along with the Standard actions of Grapple, Search, and Assist). If you want, you could instead choose the Cautious (yellow) or Reckless (red) actions on the Ally sheet for your Ally's action, but the Ally would need to discard a Trust token to do that. Choosing those actions will not change the Ally's approach, though, so even if you discard a trust to use the Ally's Reckless action for the turn, the Ally's approach is still Normal, and I still get that Stress.

Allies don't normally cause their controlling Survivor to gain stress. Some may have Fear effects and other abilities that will cause you to gain Stress, and they may also cause you stress if you're the leader through all the normal ways leaders can suffer stress, but nothing by default.

2) Also regarding Allies - they have no Survivor tokens - so does that mean they cannot contribute to the Active Event? Since in a two player game where there are two Survivors and two Allies, the event would have been picked by one of those Survivors, that means there are only two characters who can prevent the Leader from getting stressed due to non-participation and one of them is the one who picked that card. Is that correct? When setting up, following the Rulebook, the Ally is mentioned but then the term "Survivor" is used and not mentioned again until later, so I was confused.

Allies still have a pool of Survivor tokens, they just don't normally have abilities that make use of them. If some effect of the game or a specific Scenario calls for them, though, they exist. Therefore, Allies can still make use of the active event for the round.

Also, Allies are Survivors. Any effect that refers to Survivors includes Allies.

3) Language clarification: specifically when instructed to choose a Survivor. On Rick's Ally card, "Inspire" instructs you to, "Choose 1 other Survivor..." I take that to mean he cannot target himself due to the use of, "other". Citing this example, on Glenn's Ally card, his "Guide" ability says, "Choose 1 Survivor on your Tile to..."; the question here is, can Glenn choose himself? I encountered this language on several cards, such as Rick's card that allows him to Heal.

When you see "other Survivor," that means "Survivor other than this one." Therefore, if the effect doesn't say "other," a Survivor using that effect on themselves is fair game.

4) Objective Track - timing: if the conditions to advance the track more than once space exist during the Objective Phase, can it jump several spaces, or is it restricted to one move per phase?

Usually the Objective Track is restricted to advancing one time per round. To be more specific, when you get to the Objective Step, you perform whatever steps are listed on the current stage of the objective track in order. One of those steps will usually be "If [condition is met] or [Survivors do a thing], advance the objective." When you get to that step, if you meet the condition or do the thing, you advance the objective. However, when you do so, you do not start processing the steps of the new stage (with the exception of immediate effects, which are one-time things that happen when a stage on the track is reached, and can be found in red boxes). As such, you will usually have to wait until the next round's Objective Step for an opportunity to fulfill the requirements for that Stage's "advance the objective" effect.

Now, in theory, it's possible for a Scenario to have an immediate effect that allows for the advancing of the objective, or even an effect that advances the objective more than once if the right conditions are met. Off the top of my head, though, I don't believe any of the current scenarios make use of something like that yet. I could be forgetting one, though. Still, by default, it's usually one stage per round.

We have only played the first scenario so far, Scavenger Run and it so happened that before advancing the objective at all, the board was cleared of Search cards and the Survivors were on the edge of the board. Then we built our barricades, seemingly fulfilling all the objectives at once. In this case, would we have to just sit and wait for turns to elapse (in case survivor cards drawn caused a character to die) or is that an example of an objective advancing multiple times in one phase?

Lots of scenarios to go, lots of add-ons received, I'm sure I'll be asking more questions, but I appreciate you taking the time to address them. It bolsters my faith in the company. Grab yourself a Trust token!

We have only played the first scenario so far, Scavenger Run and it so happened that before advancing the objective at all, the board was cleared of Search cards and the Survivors were on the edge of the board. Then we built our barricades, seemingly fulfilling all the objectives at once. In this case, would we have to just sit and wait for turns to elapse (in case survivor cards drawn caused a character to die) or is that an example of an objective advancing multiple times in one phase?

In this example, you would still only advance one stage at a time. For Scavenging Run, I like to think of it as the group waiting until the moment is right to make a break for it. Maybe that's because they're waiting for the rain to stop, or maybe they just need to discuss among themselves whether or not they're sure they looted everything of value, but whatever the case, they can't leave just yet. That does mean that there's the risk of losing due to a survivor being defeated, morale hitting zero, or even the event deck running out while the survivors wait for their opening.

With regards to moving the objective more than once, I was imagining something like a stage with “If all Survivors are on different tiles, advance the objective. If a Survivor has Objective A, advance the objective twice instead.” Basically, it would explicitly call out to advance the objective twice. Or, alternatively, an objective stage could have an immediate (red box) effect that said something like “If you have Objective A, advance the objective.” That way, when you advance to that stage, the immediate effect would check to see if you had the Objective A card, and if so, immediately advance you again. While I can’t remember if either of these examples currently appear in a Scenario, I do believe that, hypothetically speaking, they could work.

Thank you very much for the kind words, and we hope you have a blast as you explore more of the game.

To borrow your example example, let's say I'm the Leader, and I choose a Reckless (red) approach for the round. During your turn, you choose a Normal (green) Survivor Card as the one you play for the turn. I suffer 1 Stress due to you being Defiant. After you finish your turn with your Survivor, you take your turn with your Ally. Your Ally also has a Normal approach due to the card you played, so I suffer another stress for the Ally being defiant.

You're quite right. I had a chance to get in touch with Brady Sadler, and it looks like I was operating from a misunderstanding about the concepts of Compliant and Defiant. Basically, it's the Survivor Cards that are Compliant/Defiant, not the Survivors. Stressing the leader happens when a Defiant card is played, and since Allies never play Survivor Cards, they can't stress the Leader that way. I'll edit my initial response to reflect that.